The Gadfly. E. L. Voynich
Wrights were old schoolfellows of hers who had moved to Florence.) “Then Bini wrote and told me to pass through Pisa to-day on my way home, so that I could come here. Ah! they're going to begin.”
The lecture was upon the ideal Republic and the duty of the young to fit themselves for it. The lecturer's comprehension of his subject was somewhat vague; but Arthur listened with devout admiration. His mind at this period was curiously uncritical; when he accepted a moral ideal he swallowed it whole without stopping to think whether it was quite digestible. When the lecture and the long discussion which followed it were finished and the students began to disperse, he went up to Gemma, who was still sitting in the corner of the room.
“Let me walk with you, Jim. Where are you staying?”
“With Marietta.”
“Your father's old housekeeper?”
“Yes; she lives a good way from here.”
They walked for some time in silence. Then Arthur said suddenly:
“You are seventeen, now, aren't you?”
“I was seventeen in October.”
“I always knew you would not grow up like other girls and begin wanting to go to balls and all that sort of thing. Jim, dear, I have so often wondered whether you would ever come to be one of us.”
“So have I.”
“You said you had done things for Bini; I didn't know you even knew him.”
“It wasn't for Bini; it was for the other one.”
“Which other one?”
“The one that was talking to me to-night—Bolla.”
“Do you know him well?” Arthur put in with a little touch of jealousy. Bolla was a sore subject with him; there had been a rivalry between them about some work which the committee of Young Italy had finally intrusted to Bolla, declaring Arthur too young and inexperienced.
“I know him pretty well; and I like him very much. He has been staying in Leghorn.”
“I know; he went there in November———”
“Because of the steamers. Arthur, don't you think your house would be safer than ours for that work? Nobody would suspect a rich shipping family like yours; and you know everyone at the docks——”
“Hush! not so loud, dear! So it was in your house the books from Marseilles were hidden?”
“Only for one day. Oh! perhaps I oughtn't to have told you.”
“Why not? You know I belong to the society. Gemma, dear, there is nothing in all the world that would make me so happy as for you to join us—you and the Padre.”
“Your Padre! Surely he——”
“No; he thinks differently. But I have sometimes fancied—that is—hoped—I don't know——”
“But, Arthur! he's a priest.”
“What of that? There are priests in the society—two of them write in the paper. And why not? It is the mission of the priesthood to lead the world to higher ideals and aims, and what else does the society try to do? It is, after all, more a religious and moral question than a political one. If people are fit to be free and responsible citizens, no one can keep them enslaved.”
Gemma knit her brows. “It seems to me, Arthur,” she said, “that there's a muddle somewhere in your logic. A priest teaches religious doctrine. I don't see what that has to do with getting rid of the Austrians.”
“A priest is a teacher of Christianity, and the greatest of all revolutionists was Christ.”
“Do you know, I was talking about priests to father the other day, and he said——”
“Gemma, your father is a Protestant.”
After a little pause she looked round at him frankly.
“Look here, we had better leave this subject alone. You are always intolerant when you talk about Protestants.”
“I didn't mean to be intolerant. But I think Protestants are generally intolerant when they talk about priests.”
“I dare say. Anyhow, we have so often quarreled over this subject that it is not worth while to begin again. What did you think of the lecture?”
“I liked it very much—especially the last part. I was glad he spoke so strongly about the need of living the Republic, not dreaming of it. It is as Christ said: 'The Kingdom of Heaven is within you.'”
“It was just that part that I didn't like. He talked so much of the wonderful things we ought to think and feel and be, but he never told us practically what we ought to do.”
“When the time of crisis comes there will be plenty for us to do; but we must be patient; these great changes are not made in a day.”
“The longer a thing is to take doing, the more reason to begin at once. You talk about being fit for freedom—did you ever know anyone so fit for it as your mother? Wasn't she the most perfectly angelic woman you ever saw? And what use was all her goodness? She was a slave till the day she died—bullied and worried and insulted by your brother James and his wife. It would have been much better for her if she had not been so sweet and patient; they would never have treated her so. That's just the way with Italy; it's not patience that's wanted—it's for somebody to get up and defend themselves———”
“Jim, dear, if anger and passion could have saved Italy she would have been free long ago; it is not hatred that she needs, it is love.”
As he said the word a sudden flush went up to his forehead and died out again. Gemma did not see it; she was looking straight before her with knitted brows and set mouth.
“You think I am wrong, Arthur,” she said after a pause; “but I am right, and you will grow to see it some day. This is the house. Will you come in?”
“No; it's late. Good-night, dear!”
He was standing on the doorstep, clasping her hand in both of his.
“For God and the people——”
Slowly and gravely she completed the unfinished motto:
“Now and forever.”
Then she pulled away her hand and ran into the house. When the door had closed behind her he stooped and picked up the spray of cypress which had fallen from her breast.
CHAPTER IV.
ARTHUR went back to his lodgings feeling as though he had wings. He was absolutely, cloudlessly happy. At the meeting there had been hints of preparations for armed insurrection; and now Gemma was a comrade, and he loved her. They could work together, possibly even die together, for the Republic that was to be. The blossoming time of their hope was come, and the Padre would see it and believe.
The next morning, however, he awoke in a soberer mood and remembered that Gemma was going to Leghorn and the Padre to Rome. January, February, March—three long months to Easter! And if Gemma should fall under “Protestant” influences at home (in Arthur's vocabulary “Protestant” stood for “Philistine”)———No, Gemma would never learn to flirt and simper and captivate tourists and bald-headed shipowners, like the other English girls in Leghorn; she was made of different stuff. But she might be very miserable; she was so young, so friendless, so utterly alone among all those wooden people. If only mother had lived——
In the evening he went to the seminary, where he found Montanelli entertaining the new Director and